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Monday, May 22, 2017

Half of US physicians receive industry payments

Michael McCarthy
BMJ 2017; 357

Nearly half of US physicians receive payments from the drug, medical device, and related medical industries, and surgeons and male physicians are more likely to do so, a US study has found.

The study leader, Jona A Hattangadi-Gluth, of the University of California, San Diego, based in La Jolla, said that most payments were relatively small but that many specialists receive more than $10 000 (£7750; $9160) a year from industry, including 11% of orthopedic surgeons, 12% of neurologists, and 13% of neurosurgeons.

She said, “The data suggest that these payments are much more pervasive than we thought and [that] there is much more money going directly to physicians than maybe people recognized.”

The researchers analyzed data from 2015 collected from Open Payments, a program created by the 2010 Affordable Care Act that requires biomedical manufacturers and group purchasing organizations to report all general payments, ownership interests, and research payments paid to allopathic and osteopathic physicians in the US.